Hybrid is as Hybrid does

[doublehelix]

I grow several hybrids. Hybrids like Sungold, Better Boy, Big Beef, Mountain Magic and Jetstar and others all have things worth paying for. That is what keeps me coming back year after year to buy the seeds. A lot of thought and work goes into creating a hybrid worthy for the tomato market. The parents in a commercial hybrid cross will consistently produce the desired results. The seed is predictable and always what the customer expects to get. However, I would not give you a nickel for a bucketful of the saved seed from any of them.

As many of you know, when you try to re-grow hybrid seeds you mostly end up with something that is nothing like the parent and quite often is unfit for human consumption. I cannot imagine wanting to buy second or third generation seeds from one of these well-known hybrids.

So, why would anyone pay for someone’s second or third generation of seeds from a hybrid that was unproven? If leftover seeds from Sungold are junk, isn’t it likely that seed from some amateurs crossing project is going to be a wasted spot in your garden?

If you let a hybrid tomato self-pollinate, then every generation the number of mixed or non-pure (you could still call them hybrid) tomatoes will diminish by 50%. So if the first generation is 100% hybrid, the next generation, or F2 has 50% hybrids mixed in, the next generation will have 25% and the next 12.5% etc. These are not hybrids that are consistent and predictable. These are just random plants that will most likely be undesirable. F2 or even F5 seeds are still hybrid seeds. I am in a state of disbelief at the number of companies jumping into this game. There is even one company calling a tomato a “Blend”. That is how someone who has made a career bad mouthing hybrid seeds, sells hybrid seeds.

Even seeds that are six generations away from the initial cross will have about 30 seeds out of every 1000 that are still hybrid. So if they are selling 30 seeds in a pack and 250 people purchase a pack of seeds what we are going to see is about 230 tomatoes that do not match the description. These 230 tomato plants are more than likely just junk. What will happen to these 230 tomatoes? They will be declared “new” or “mutations”. They will be named, passed around, and they too will be unstable and produce even more false assumptions and renaming.

There is going to be a glut of crappy named varieties hit this hobby in the next five years like the world has never seen. Not only that, but there will be hundreds of growth habits, shapes, sizes, and colors of tomatoes all with the SAME name. Also, there will be hundreds of tomatoes that are nearly IDENTICAL that will have DIFFERENT names too. This can’t be good for this hobby. The world does not need 10,000 new mediocre tomatoes.

What is the motivation for doing this?

I find it hard to believe seed vendors are selling unstable hybrids, and billing them as open pollinated.

When the seeds from Tomatoville’s Dwarf project were stolen, there was an interesting quote.

Originally Posted by nctomatoman

What I see is a world where there is far too much apathy and personal laziness - people very happy to piggy back on or take other folks' hard work just to make a buck.